Socialisation of ALL Housing is needed to save the Working Class from Poverty, Sickness and Hunger

It is a necessity of life to be adequately housed.  Although there are people who prefer to live unconventionally, for the vast majority of people, homelessness, or the fear of homelessness, is a very real problem.

In the UK today, there are 18 million people who cannot afford the most basic of life's requirements. 18 million people live in homes which are inadequate or are not fit to be inhabited, cannot afford to heat the dwellings they struggle to pay to live in, and find it impossible to put decent and sufficient food on the table.

The tyranny of poverty has grown over the last 30 years, from 14% of the population surviving in conditions which are well below the acceptable standard of living, to a terrifying 33% (a third of the population) today being forced to live in ways which are unfit for human beings.  At the same time, deregulation, the spread of finance capitalism, and the enrichment of the Ruling Class and their accomplices, has made the UK a nation divided into haves and have nots.  The economy has doubled in size over the last 30 years, but the number of people in poverty has more than doubled.  Clearly, growth in GDP and GNP does not benefit the People as a whole, only those at the top, who achieve their wealth by exploiting the rest of us.

The Economic and Social Research Council commissioned the Poverty and Social Exclusion Report (2014), the findings of which make worrying reading for the Working Class of the UK.  28% of adults regularly skip meals so that children do not have to.  4 Million children and adults are malnourished, the overwhelming majority of whom are indigenous English, the children live with both parents and at least 1 sibling, and at least 1 parent works.  1 in 6 adults is in low paid employment, bringing in insufficient money to pay for food, heating and accommodation, being forced to cut down on the former, to pay for the latter.  Debt is rising at rates previously unheard of, with evictions and home repossessions soaring.  It is the indigenous English Working Class who are suffering most, although the indigenous Working Class of the rest of the UK are also faring badly.

5.5 million Working Class people cannot afford essential clothes, forcing them to wear clothes which one would have hoped to see consigned to a page of a Dickens' novel.  2.5 million Working Class children live in homes which are damp, putting them in danger of developing respiratory illnesses and other very dangerous forms of ill health.  1.5 million Working Class children live in homes which are not heated, adding to the dangers to health.  The indigenous English Working Class is treated like cattle by the Ruling Class, and those who collaborate with them in putting the pursuit of profit over the welfare of people.

SWPE is the Party of the English Working Class.  We have members who have come to us from the SWP, and they have told us of how that organisation is almost entirely a Bourgeois Middle Class operation, which panders to typical Middle Class liberal obsessions, and treats its few Working Class members as oddities, fit only for physical activities which the patronising Bourgeois 'class warriors' don't have the stomach for.  SWPE members don't need to read reports to tell us how hard life is for the Working Class.  We are Working Class, and we know what it is like to suffer.  Food Banks, Lack of Money, Hunger, Cold, Damp, Pathetic Wages, Loan Shark Interest Rates - these may be the stuff of theory to the hypocrites who control the SWP, fighting on issues which damage the Working Class, but for SWPE, these are parts of life which we are forced to endure thanks to the selfishness of others in our country who sneer at us for being poor, but do nothing to alleviate the problems we face.

The lack of decent and appropriate housing is the result of the Capitalist worship of Profit, and also of the Liberal obsession with Open Borders.  Capitalism requires mass unemployment to stop the People from asking for decent wages and decent working conditions.  The Capitalist is restricted and limited by Borders, which protect the indigenous population from competition in employment by people coming to the country, or taking jobs through outsourcing.  It is natural for people who despise their Working Class countrymen to have no concerns for the well being of people who will have their living standards reduced even further by unlimited immigration.  The despicable Capitalist is only obeying his lust for profit by calling for ends to immigration controls.  He may even profit by being a part of the industrial house building system, which thrives on the destruction of the countryside as easy and to build legoland housing on.  In any case, the fact of more people seeking accommodation, than the number of homes available, ensures that house prices are kept artificially high, effectively blocking the Working Class from home ownership and keeping rents at an unreasonably high rate.

Working in unison with the greedy Capitalists, the most vocal advocates of ending Sovereignty, are the ones who claim to be anti-Capitalist.  The Trotskyites and their fellow liberals demand that endless 'refugees' are allowed to come to the UK.  Sitting in their nice suburban homes, the Middle Class 'social justice warriors' are immune from the impact of immigration.  They do not have to live in squalid houses and flats in areas where the police fear to go.  They do not live in gated communities where the real world is kept firmly at bay.  It is easy to pontificate on the need for open borders and for the mass building of housing to accommodate the extra millions in population, when one can afford private medical care, elitist schooling and all the luxuries of the Middle Class lifestyle. It is totally different when one has to deal with the realities of overcrowded criminally-unsafe cities, an education system which enfeebles children, and an NHS which is dying alongside its patients - all factors worsened by an increasing population which the infrastructure and land of the country cannot cope with.

Housing is a fundamental requirement for humans.  In the UK there are an obscene number of properties which are under used.  Nobody can use two homes at the same time, yet second homes are a reality, and to make matters worse, the holiday homes for the rich tend to be located in areas of high unemployment for the local population, with the accompanying problems of homelessness and poverty.  The rich swan into areas they find pretty and relaxing, to use housing which they do not need, for brief periods in the year, while local people live in overcrowded and inadequate properties (if housed at all).  This is unacceptable and inhumane.

Landlordism is an even greater problem than the issue of second homes.  The Duke of Westminster owns 133,100 acres of land in Britain and half of the land in London, from which he extorts ground rent even from people who own the property which sits on that ground.  He is a landlord with so much property that his income has created a wealth in excess of £9 billion - none of it earned, none of it justifiable, all of it the result of inheriting the spoils of exploitation from father to son for generations.

Landlordism on a smaller scale than the Duke of Westminster's exploitation, has been boosted by the 'buy to rent' industry.  The practice of buying a home and then renting it out to tenants who not only pay the mortgage, but make the landlord a profit, is now commonplace.  It has resulted in property ownership becoming a way to make money doing nothing. In addition it has driven rents up and created economic misery for people who cannot afford to but one home, let alone a series of properties.

SWPE calls for an end to Landlordism in any form.  SWPE calls for the total socialisation of all housing and for the restoration of common land to the People.  Homes are for living in, not for making profit from.  We would abolish all rented housing, making the tenants owners.  We would abolish the buying and selling of housing, creating instead a system of occupancy transfer for people to swap their properties should they wish to relocate.  Ground rent is immoral and would be abolished without compensation.  People who own more than one home would be made to choose which home to live in, with the others being reallocated to people who actually need them.

The last of the landed aristocracy who still live in mansions and palaces which they gained through hereditary exploitation, would be relocated to ordinary accommodation to suit their needs according to family size, with the buildings themselves being turned into centres of cultural importance for the population of the country at large.

In a Socialist Society, everyone will be housed and no homes will be left empty.  There will be no such thing as rent or mortgages.  The only people who will lose out will be the bankers, finance industry, and people who have lived like parasites draining their fellow human beings of hard earned money (or for those who cannot find work, their much needed benefits) while they do nothing but collect payments they have undertaken no work to earn.

When this point is reached, the issue of immigration can be addressed.  But while even a single family or individual is unwillingly homeless, not a single new immigrant must be granted access to the housing stock.  We must fix our fundamental problems before we move on to other matters.